"Not a bit of it, Lizzy; none of your insinuations! I just wetted my bargain, as everybody should, and that was all. I'm sorry your cap is tumbled." "Crushed, spoiled, _abeemy_," (query _abîmé_?) "as Miss Mincing says." "But I'll tell you what: it is a sort of a flashy thing I can't abide, and I had rather by half see you in such a cap as old Dame Foster wears." "My love, you are quite uncivil: you have quite lost your manners. I am sure you are saying what you do not think, and I am sure that all the while you like to see your wife look neat and genteel." "Neat, I do, and neatness is gentility enough for me. Come, I'll buy you a new cap after my own fashion; and then if you take half the bows, and all the flowers, off this queer thing," and he held the cap up aloft, dangling by one of its strings, "you will have two decent caps, instead of one out-of-the-way concern." "You have no taste, dear Mr. Otley!" said poor Mrs. Otley, as she pinched, and pulled, and tried to squeeze the unfortunate cap into its pristine shape. Mr. Otley watched her as she put her head first on this side, then on that, looking distressfully on the cap, and every now and then giving it a masterly twitch. "Now, what puzzles me, Lizzy, is, when you look to wearing this cap: you can't go to church in it, and you can't drive out in the cart in it; and hang me if I know when you mean to put it on." "Surely, Mr. Otley, every woman should have something decent to wear if visitors should come." "I'm sure Farmer Dobson will never know what sort of a cap you have on your head, and Mr. Higgins is quite a plain sort of a man; and 'tis but seldom they call in, except just in the way of business." "But Mr. Dobson has a wife, and daughters too," answered Mrs. Otley triumphantly; "and Mrs. Higgins's lace-veil, last Sunday, was quite the talk of the whole church. I am sure I heard of it three times before I could get down the church-yard and into our chaise; and I saw all the bonnets moving in all the pews as she came up the aisle with her beautiful veil hanging down almost to her knees." Mr. Otley had nothing to reply, and Mrs. Otley remained in possession of the field. CHAPTER IX. Cancel all our vows; And, when we meet at any time again, Be it not seen in either of our brows That we one jot of former love retain. Michael Drayton.